


Ketch and Release Chapter 3

by justcallmeasmodeus



Series: Ketch and Release [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-07
Updated: 2018-11-07
Packaged: 2019-08-20 01:13:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16545977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justcallmeasmodeus/pseuds/justcallmeasmodeus





	Ketch and Release Chapter 3

The water at the bottom of the tub turned brown as Y/N scrubbed a week’s worth of grime from her body. As the dirt circled the drain, the water was tinted pink from blood still seeping from day old wounds reopened by the steam. She winced as she cleaned them, calculating which ones might need stitched and which ones would close on their own. She scrubbed her skin until the small bar of hotel soap was gone before closing her eyes and resting her forehead on the shower wall, but there were some things she couldn’t scrub away.

Y/N drank half the whiskey in her med kit before she even began to sterilize her wounds. It burned over her tongue and down her throat, providing a momentary distraction from the images flashing through her mind. It calmed her enough to steady her hand, so she focused her mind on her wounds, sewing them as much as possible, applying ointment and covering them with gauze. She eyed the leftover whiskey but decided against it. She loaded up her gear, grabbed the keys to her truck, and headed to check out.

She stopped for coffee at a diner in Lawrence, unsure what had brought her here. Maybe she had been chasing better memories, simpler times. She looked around the room and tried to remember the good times this diner held: sharing half a pie with Dean on the barstools, talking research with Sam in the booth in the back, Bobby bringing her down to visit with the boys and John for her 13th birthday. The memories were gone as fast as she could conjure them, pushed away by the scream still ringing in her ears, the sound of flesh being torn from bone.

She jumped when her cell phone rang, nearly spilling her cup of coffee. She let it ring for a few moments, taking a few deep breaths and mentally preparing herself for a lecture from Dean. She answered without checking the caller I.D., warily pressing the phone against hear ear. There was silence at first, and then Castiel’s deep voice.

“Y/N?”

“Castiel?” She sat up a bit straighter, the worry evident in his voice.

“Where are you?”

“I…” She sighed, slumping again. “I’m in Lawrence.”

“I need you to meet me at the bunker, please.”

He hung up before giving any more explanation, but the worry had sent the wheels in her head spinning once more. She left some money on the table for her coffee and walked out, trying her best to leave behind the failed hunt.

When Y/N got to the bunker the Impala was sitting in the garage, the engine ticking as it cooled down. She grabbed her hunting bag and walked into the kitchen, chewing her lip as she went. Castiel was sitting in at the map, his forehead cradled on the heels of his hands.

“Cas? Where’s Sam and Dean? What’s wrong?” Cas looked up at her, and the look in his eyes sent her bag thudding to the floor.

“They’re gone.”

 

* * *

 

Y/N stalked over to the liquor cabinet, snatching out a bottle of Jack. Her emotions were running high, making her head spin. She couldn’t think straight, her hands were shaking, and her body was begging her for sleep. The whiskey burned as she drank from the bottle.

“So let me get this straight, you _left_ them?” She slammed the bottle back on the table, causing the glasses to rattle.

“I didn’t leave them, Dean told me to go! I was taking Kelly-”

“Oh yeah, the woman who is delivering the antichrist and is now on the loose, no thanks to you.”

“It’s not my fau-”

“Save it Castiel. I guess neither of us can do anything right.”

Y/N grabbed the bottle of whiskey and headed off to her bedroom before Castiel could say anything more. She sat cross-legged in the middle of her bed, letting the tears run down her face, taking a drink for every scream that echoed in her brain.

 

* * *

 

The shrill ring of a phone pulled Y/N into a throbbing consciousness. She groaned, holding her head with one hand and steadying herself with the other as she kicked the empty Jack bottle across the floor on her way to the desk. Loose papers fell and fluttered to the floor as she dug through the drawers searching for the phone, desperate to stop the sound.

“Hello?” She croaked when she finally found it, holding the phone away from her ear as she answered.

“Y/N? Is… is that you?”

“Yeah,” Y/N cleared her throat. “It’s me.”

“Oh thank God. We need your help, please. We thought it was just one werewolf… but it’s a pack. We’re in over our heads.”

“Maybe I’m not the bes-”

“We heard you were working on a quiet, long range weapon. We need it. We’ve lost two already trying to get close. They have captives.” The line went silent as Y/N closed her eyes. The events of the last 48 hours blurred past her mind, and she sighed.

“Where are you?”

“Louisiana. I can text you our coordinates.”

“I’ll be there.”

* * *

 

Ketch hated the American south. The sun beat down on his leather jacket relentlessly, causing beads of sweat to run down the sides of his face underneath his helmet. The tires of his bike chewed at the miles before him, but he would be elated when the job was done and he could head the other direction, back to air conditioning and away from the abomination known as _sweet tea._

His foul mood was forgotten when he pulled off the highway and rolled to a stop next to an ancient yet pristine powder blue pick up truck. It was clearly a hunter’s, and he hated it. It stood out, it was inefficient, and it was gaudy. He shook his head as he hid his bike. He had strict orders; take out the werewolf pack if the American hunters haven’t yet, and if the American hunters are there, observe how they hunt. Do not interfere unless the American hunters fail.

Ketch turned and eyed the truck again before taking the parts of his gun out of his bag and assembling them; judging by their transportation alone, it would only be a matter of time before he was cleaning up another mess.

The cabin wasn’t hard to find. He could hear the hunt before he crested the hill, the sounds of broken glass and the screaming of captives echoing in the otherwise silent forest. He was walking around the perimeter, looking for a good place to scout from, when he caught a glimpse of her through the back window. He hid himself behind a tree and shouldered his gun so he could use his scope to see.

Y/N was by herself in a room with three wolves, and two more lay dead on the ground. She was bleeding, her face was smeared with a mix of sweat and blood and dirt, but her teeth were clenched in determination, fear nowhere to be found. They surrounded her, fangs out and jaws snapping, and she returned a toothy grin of her own. Ketch watched as she stabbed one and pivoted to stab another, stumbling when her blade caught and she was drug down as the wolf collapsed.

The third jumped and pinned her to the floor. Ketch waited for the other hunters to help her, but they were ushering humans out of the front, running toward the road. He waited for her to scream, but she didn’t make a sound. Ketch’s orders replayed through his head as he watched the wolf lean in, drool dripping from his mouth down onto her neck.

 

* * *

 

The werewolf’s body convulsed as the bullet tore through his brain. Y/N jumped at the sound of breaking glass and flipped as soon as the pressure on her shoulders was released. The body slumped to the floor and she looked out the window for the source of the shot. She caught a glimpse of leather as it ducked behind a tree, but before she could get a better look Alicia burst into the room, ready to join the fight.

“Y/N!” She rolled the werewolf the rest of the way off so that Y/N could get up. “Y/N are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Did you get everyone out?” Y/N stood up and wiped her hands off on her jeans before collecting her knife.

“Yeah, Max is taking them all back to town.”

“Convenient of him to leave us to clean up.” Y/N toed the head of one of the bodies with her boot, grimacing as it rolled limply.

“Burn pile?” Alicia asked, pointing to a can of gas behind her.

“Burn pile.” Y/N agreed with a grin.

 

* * *

 

The light was fading when they made it back to Y/N’s truck. She threw her hunting bag in the back, pausing when she turned to walk back to the cab. She tilted her head and knelt down.

“Is there a problem?” Alicia asked as she leaned in the doorway.

“No, no everything is fine.” She studied the motorcycle tracks for a few more seconds before standing up and flashing a smile at Alicia. “Let’s go home.”

 

* * *

 

When Y/N got back to the bunker, Cas and his truck were gone. The Impala sat untouched in her spot in the garage, a silent reminder of the issue at hand. She leaned against her truck and looked at the Impala, chewing her bottom lip while the wheels in her mind began to turn. She walked inside, started a load of laundry, made some dinner, and got to work.

She was in the library on her laptop when Cas walked in. She was surrounded by take-out boxes and dirty dishes, open notebooks and pens, books and sticky notes. Her hair was unbrushed, her shirt dirty, her eyes bloodshot from lack of sleep.

“Y/N.” She jumped when Castiel said her name. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Cas.” She put her laptop down and stretched before standing up and walking over to him. “I’m sorry. Sam and Dean, that’s wasn’t your fault. I never should have blamed you for that.” Cas smiled softly at her before looking at the floor. “I’m looking. I’m searching everywhere, but I keep hitting dead ends. It’s like chasing a ghost. They’ve been gone-”

“Six weeks, two days, and ten hours.”

“We’ve got to find them. Until then, we just keep doing our best.”

“Are we though? Are we doing our best?” Y/N froze, her eyes widening as the buried memory of a little girl who would never return home forced its way back to the front of her brain. “Did you hear about the murders in Lancaster, Missouri?”

“No…”

“Women. Throats ripped out, blood drained.”

“Vampire.”

“I tried. I drove into town, I asked around. I don’t know what I did wrong, but I couldn’t find it. Three more women died and I couldn’t… I ran.”

“Let’s go back. You and me.”

“No, you were right. I can’t do anything right.”

“Cas…” Y/N reached to pull him into a hug, but he turned and walked away.

She turned and looked at the library, all the progress she wasn’t making. She felt like she had circled the internet twice, exhausting every lead, and she had nothing to show for it. She closed her laptop, cleaned up the room a bit, and headed to shower and pack. Lancaster just made its way to the top of her to-do list.

* * *

 

The phone rang while Y/N watched the vamps body burning. She tossed the dirty rag from cleaning her machete on to the fire as she answered.

“Hey Cas. Don’t worry about that vamp. I took care of it.”

“Y/N… It’s Dean. He called.”

“I’m on my way.”

 

* * *

 

“What are we getting into?” Y/N asked as Castiel climbed into her truck.

“I’m not sure.” Castiel buckled his seatbelt as the truck lurched forward.

“We should call in backup.”

“I may have an idea.”

* * *

 

Y/N recognized the Bentley instantly. It gleamed in the glow from her headlights as she threw the truck into park. She turned and looked at Cas with a raised eyebrow.

“This is your backup plan?” Castiel met her gaze and wordlessly stepped out of the truck. They walked to the front of the truck, and Y/N looked up into the face of her valiant one night stand. A grin crawled across his face.

“Hello Annie.”


End file.
